from the nobody-wins? dept

We'd been covering the Coupons.com DMCA legal saga for a few years now, and we thought it had ended back in November, when Coupons.com dropped its case against John Stottlemire. If you don't recall, Stottlemire was sued because he'd realized that if you deleted a few files on your hard drive, you could reprint coupons issued via Coupons.com's software. The company claimed this was a DMCA anti-circumvention violation -- though it seemed odd to claim that simply telling people to delete some files eliminated any sort of copy protection. Also there were significant questions as to whether or not what Coupons.com was doing was actually copy protection. Stottlemire was doing a pretty good job (as an individual) fighting back, and the company finally dropped the case.

But... apparently after Stottlemire bragged that he "kicked [Coupons.com's] ass," the company tried to reopen the case, claiming that Stottlemire had breached the non-disclosure agreement on the settlement and claiming that they need to reopen the case to "set the record straight." It's difficult to see how claiming you "kicked their ass" breaches any disclosure agreements, since it's hardly giving away much of anything. And, it appears, a judge has agreed, denying the request to reopen the case. The judge did say that Stottlemire's statement was a breach, but hardly an egregious one, and certainly not a big enough deal to reopen the case.

from the legal-issues-left-unsettled dept

We've been covering the DMCA lawsuit filed by Coupons.com against a guy, John Stottlemire, who figured out that if you delete a few files on your hard drive you could make extra copies of the coupon. Coupons.com tried to greatly stretch the DMCA to claim that this was circumventing copy protection -- but simply telling people to delete files on a hard drive hardly seems to be an circumvention tool. Plus, there were some legal issues over whether or not what Coupons.com was doing was really "copy protection." In many cases, Coupons.com's arguments seemed to contradict itself, though Stottlemire (who defended himself) was quick to point that out to the court.

It looks like Coupons.com recognized that this lawsuit was going to end badly, and has now agreed to dismiss the case. This is a big win for Stottlemire, though it's unfortunate that there was no legal ruling on this attempt to stretch the meaning of the DMCA's anti-circumvention clause. It will, undoubtedly, come up again in the future in other lawsuits.

from the let's-get-this-straight dept

We recently noted the somewhat mixed ruling in the Coupons.com lawsuit over whether or not it's a DMCA violation to merely tell people to delete some files from their hard drive. The ruling noted that Coupons.com was trying to make a rather questionable argument. It's a bit technical, and it required multiple readings to really understand what's going on here, but effectively, Coupons.com is trying to invoke the DMCA's anti-circumvention clause to punish a programmer who figured out how to get around the limits enforced by Coupons.com's software, which lets users use a coupon a limited number of times. The real issue in this case is whether the software is about preventing uses or copies. If it's uses, then it's not covered by the DMCA. If it's copies, then it is. The court noted that it certainly seems like the software is focused on uses rather than copies, as there's no actual part of the software that blocks you from accessing the coupons as much as you want. It just blocks you from using them.

The programmer, John Stottlemire, who is being sued in this case, writes in to let us know that Coupons.com has just described its system in a misleading way in order to convince the court that its software really is copy protection rather than use protection, claiming: "The features block an individual computer's access to a particular coupon offer altogether if that computer does not have the proper registry keys in place." In other words, there is copy protection that blocks access if the registry keys are missing.

That claim may sound a lot like copy protection, but that's not actually how their system works. Coupons.com doesn't block access to its coupons based on a registry key -- because if you don't have a registry key, Coupons.com simply issues you new one. And that's not how copy protection usually works; that's how usage protection works. If the system worked the way it was described to the court, then first-time users, who would not have the proper registry keys, should not be able to use Coupons.com because they would be blocked from accessing coupons. But Coupons.com doesn't do that to new users -- all users without registry keys are simply given new keys (and not blocked whatsoever).

Basically, Coupons.com appears to be pretending that its software doesn't work without a certain registry key in order to convince the judge that its software actually qualifies under the DMCA as copy protection. But, if it were copy protection, then Stottlemire's programs (or written instructions) for how to defeat the software by deleting the registry key wouldn't work. All Stottlemire's method of "circumvention" would do is trigger the copy protection to deny access. So, either Coupons.com is lying to the judge, or Stottlemire's program and instructions couldn't have done what they claim it did (in which case he wouldn't have broken the law). So... basically, it sounds like Coupons.com is either lying or they have no case. And, if they're lying, they don't have much of a case either.

from the will-have-to-wait-for-the-trial dept

John Stottlemire, who is being sued by Coupons.com in a case we've been covering, writes in himself to let us know that the court has ruled on various motions to dismiss (warning: pdf). If you don't recall, Coupons.com offers online coupons using some software. The software is designed to limit how many copies of a coupon each person can print, but Stottlemire figured out ways to easily get around that limit and both built a tool to do so, as well as explained how to do it manually -- at which point Coupons.com sued him for a DMCA violation, claiming he circumvented their anti-copying mechanism. The specifics of the case are pretty confusing, but basically Coupons.com is trying to stretch the DMCA beyond what it was intended for. The ruling dismisses some of Coupons.com's claims, while allows others to go forward.

It's not a complete win, but the court did deny Coupons.com's attempt to blur the line between "rights-control" and "access-control" which is a good thing. However, on the issue of whether or not just explaining how to circumvent the copy protection by deleting some files is a DMCA violation, the court is allowing that issue to move forward at trial. So while this is a good partial win, we'll still have to wait and see what happens in the next stages of this case to determine whether or not Coupons.com can expand the DMCA.

from the we're-about-to-find-out dept

Last summer, we wrote about a very questionable DMCA lawsuit filed by Coupons.com. The company lets people download coupons using its own software. The software is designed to limit how many copies of a coupon people can make. The company accused John Stottlemire of violating the anti-circumvention part of the DMCA by offering up some software that would help people get around the copy limit. However, he didn't just offer up software to do it, elsewhere he explained how you could do it manually, just by deleting a couple of files on your computer. That's hardly a "hack." There was no encryption to defeat, just some files to delete. Basically, Coupons.com couldn't be bothered to come up with a system that was actually secure and put in only the weakest of "protections."

Yet, Coupons.com claims that telling people to delete some files is circumventing their copy protection. The EFF (along with the Samuelson Law, Technology & Public Policy Clinic at UC Berkeley) have now filed an amicus brief with the court pointing out the numerous problems with the charges. As the filing notes, the DMCA is focused on people providing a "technology, product, service, device, component, or part thereof," and comments on a website hardly seem to qualify. It also notes that even if the court interprets written comments to be included, the DMCA is specific that it does not diminish any free speech rights. The filing also looks at other problems with the Coupons.com filing, including the company mixing up the difference between access controls and rights controls. Hopefully the judge realizes that this is (yet another) abuse of the DMCA and tosses the case out quickly.

from the so-says-one-company dept

One of the worst parts of the DMCA is the "anti-circumvention" law that makes it illegal to help people get around any kind of copy protection. First of all, there are plenty of legitimate reasons why someone might want to get around copy protection -- but, more importantly, if someone is violating copyrights by getting around copy protection, then they should be liable, rather than the person who showed them how to get around the copy protection. However, that's not how the DMCA is written -- and because of that, we get ridiculous situations like the following. A guy pointed out that if you delete a few files from your computer, the limitations on how many coupons you can print via coupons.com disappear. Coupons.com is responding by filing a DMCA lawsuit against him. Remember, he's not hacking their software in any way. He's just pointing out that their software protection scheme is so poorly designed, that deleting a few files renders it useless. And for that, he may be facing tremendous fines. The problem here isn't that this guy pointed out that their software was weak -- but that their software was weak in the first place.